Skinny Spaghetti & Meatballs

The post I had planned to post today instead of this one started with “Have you ever cooked something so so great thet you instanly knew that you had to post about it even if that means you have to break your schedule?”… but I’m posting these spaghetti & meatballs recipe instead, since these are so awesome that they’re worth ruining my weelky posting schedule a thousand times.

For the record, I just had to google how to write “Spaghetti”.

I don’t even know how to write it in my mother language, oh well.

Back to the “spaghetti” (it sounds so weird, oh my gosh)… Saying that these are fantastic is an understandement. Basically, we’re talking about a comforting dish of pasta and meatballs in a creamy tomato and red pepper sauce that is healthy and can be made ahead as well. See? Too awesome to be put into words.

Spaghetti and meatballs get a healthy makeover with whole wheat pasta, baked chicken meatballs and a tomato and garden vegetable sauce made from scratch. Top them with some good aged manchego or parmesan and you’re in dinner heaven. Oh, and I added roasted garlic as well, and you know how everything tastes x100000 better with the addition of roasted garlic. That stuff is like the brown butter of savory dishes. In other words: terrific.

The sauce alone is so flavorsome that you won’t miss the extra fat and white carbs. Tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, red peppers, onion, basil, extra-virgin olive oil and a whole head of roasted garlic simmered to perfection and then thickened with a bit of rosemary crusted manchego… Can you think of any better?

Oh, I can see some of you thinking that the meatballs will result dry and tasteless due to the lack of fat and the fact that they’re baked instead of fried. But oh, boy, they’re so juicy! I added an onion to the mix, and the egg makes a wonderful job keeping them tender. Tough meatballs? Not these ones!

Next time you’re craving comfort food, make these instead of their fatty counterparts. Calories saved are calories that you can waste on cookies… I mean, now’s the time for Christmas Cookie Baking and you know you’ll be indulging on lots of sugar and butter laden creations, won’t you? What’s better than a plate full of Skinny Spaghetti and Meatballs to make up for it?

You can make the meatballs ahead of time and they can even be frozen and thawed the day you bake them.
Add ground chicken, salt, pepper, egg, olive oil, breadcrumbs, minced onion and garlic to a bowl.
Mix with your hands until fully combined.
Form balls with your hands, and refrigerate them for at least 30 minutes so they hold their shape better.
Bake at 200ºC (400 F) for 20-25 minutes or until cooked trough.

Roast the garlic at the same time that you’re baking the meatballs.
Add all of the sauce ingredients except for the cheese to a food proccesor and pulse until pureed.
Heat 1-2 tbsp. of olive oil in a saucepan. When it’s hot, add the vegetable puree.
Simmer for 30-35 minutes until all the juice evaporates.
Stir shredded cheese.

Add cooked pasta and baked meatballs to the sauce and simmer for 5-10 minutes more.

When still warm, add extra shredded cheese and fresh basil to garnish.

I hope you’ve all had a wonderful weekend! I myself can’t complain, as mine involved layer cake making since it’s mum’s birthday today (happy birthday, mum!!) and a lovely brunch. I’ll be posting about them later this week, but these spaghetti were so good that I had to tell you about them. How about you? Did you cook anything amazing this weekend?

And I’m still looking for a new recipe plugin. Any suggestions? The Get Me Cooking one won’t work for me, and I’ve recently tried Recipe Card just to find out that it messes up with my blog and I get the “death blank page or whatever it’s called”, it’s so annoying!

I love that you used so many fresh veggies in this spaghetti sauce. It looks incredibly healthy and nutritious — not to mention flavorful! Sorry I have no recipe plugin suggestions. I’m on blogger, so none of the recipe plugins will work for me!

Good grieg, this definitely qualifies as fantastic! Baked chicken meatballs – oh my word, must try. Healthy sauce? Whole wheat pasta? I have no words. Pinned and on my must make list. Thank you for sharing Consuelo!

This looks awesome! I love that the sauce is loaded with so many veggies, it sounds so fresh and flavorful! Gorgeous photos too, pinning – makes me just want to grab a fork full of spaghetti noodles right from the screen – yum 🙂

Well just back from London and looking for some seriously low fat food for the next few weeks as eaten faaaaar too much! It’s like you’ve read my mind! Love the idea of using aubergine in the sauce – bet it gives it real depth! Adding this to my low fat menu for the week right now

You are so smart, Consuelo – saving calories on dinner equals more room for Christmas cookies! I love the way you think! : ) And spaghetti and meatball is such a favorite around here. I love the chicken version. Yum!

Oh my gosh Consuelo – these look AMAZING! Spaghetti is one of our very favorite comfort foods – and it’s always our go-to recipe when we are starving and need to feel comforted. This is a great twist on what we usually make – and I’d love to try it! And girl, how in the world do you get these amazing photos? I can barely take the picture before I’m devouring it – no staging for me – girl I’m hungry! LOL

These are so comforting indeed! I’m so glad you like them yay!
Actually, I made the dish and photographed it right after having breakfast so I wasn’t hungry, and I had them reheated for lunch, which makes them even better! Awwh, thank you so much, your comments make my day 😀

You had me at spaghetti (you’re right, totally weird to write), and again at chicken meatballs, and then I was all in at roasted garlic. YUMMMM. Definitely making this ASAP. I do love me some spaghetti and meatballs.

I have a confession to make. I have never made spaghetti sauce from scratch before. Growing up in a house where canned sauce was contraband, I just sort of crave it now that I am an adult. But I really need to give the homemade a shot.

Have you ever watched Giada on the Foodnetwork? Everytime I hear or say “Spaghetti” I think of her saying it in her Italian accent. Lol.
I love how you made the meatballs with ground chicken! Very cool way to enjoy the dish with a lower fat content…I’ll need this after the Thanksgiving day holiday!

Haha I do both those things (posting a recipe earlier than scheduled because I’m excited about it and googling words to check spelling) oh man I just love Italian food, this sounds like my ideal dinner!

Happy belated birthday to your mum, Consuelo! I hope she had a wonderful day! I’m really excited to try your meatballs – it’s so true that chicken or turkey meatballs can sometimes become dry and tough, but these look just delicious! And the sauce with all those veggies? Double-yum! Hey – and about recipe plug-ins: on THK, Gretchen and I simultaneously run Easy Recipe and ZipList. They both offer slightly different functionality, so the combination is really the perfect solution. It takes a couple of very easy tweaks to get them to play nicely together, but we’ve had that combo working since we launched back in May, and we’re thrilled with it!

[…] to share my ideas with you all! Up until the date, I’ve skinnified some classics, such as Spaghetti and Meatballs, Mac & Cheese, Nutella, Cinnamon Rolls and Shepherds Pie among others… and they were all […]

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Hi, I'm Consuelo and I like to spend my time obsessing over cute cats on the internet and eating all the peanut butter I can get my hands on. Come say hi and be my dessert and furry creature obsessed friend!